Aggressive Barred Rock Rooster

Lightning, our beautiful 6 month old Barred Rock rooster, is coming up behind me and clawing the back of my calves. This started a few days ago. He doesn't do it to my boyfriend. He eats mealy worms out of my hand and lets me pick him up and pet him. After he clawed me this morning, I picked him up and he relaxed to the point of almost falling asleep. I don't want to send him to freezer camp and I don't know what to do. As he gets older and his spurs come in, this will be a real problem. Any ideas? He's our only rooster and has just started fertilizing eggs.

Sorry to hear your rooster is aggressive. He's at the age when his hormones are racing. They say it's best to never make a pet out of a rooster. That means no holding or petting or feeding by hand. This keeps them a little wary of you which is good. Once they think of you as part of the flock, that is when the trouble begins.

If you do some research on the forums you'll find some ideas of what you might do to help the situation. Some of these are to hold the rooster and carry him around, or spray him with water, or lead him around by tapping him with a long stick. I separated my rooster and put him in a small coop and pen by himself. Gave him just enough food and water for each day so that he'd start to see me as the food lady. Did that for 2 months. Let him out. Next day he was attacking people again. Grandson was afraid to go out into the yard. He was a skinny Polish so didn't even deserve freezer camp. He was disposed of.

He had the last laugh. Five weeks later I found out a hen had a hidden nest. She presented me with 10 of his offspring. One is a cockerel, and I mean UGLY cockerel. So far he has been polite. Have read the personality is often inherited. I'm watching him.

I would quit picking him up. If you are too friendly with him you might be causing the issue. Because he doesn't fear you and in the chicken world, fear equals respect. I have a coddle boy going after me sometimes, he was our favorite because he seemed so friendly when younger. But he has tried to pull hens out of my lap once he reached mating age. And got the back of my leg and acted like he was innocent the first couple of times...

Thank you EggSighted4Life! I read both the posts and used the switch to corner him today and will keep doing it. Now I understand that sweet and gentle doesn't work with roosters. Who knew? Certainly not this newbie! Thank you again. Awesome advice

Well, when this newb got cockerels for the first time, I went out of my way to step around them and thinking that would teach them to trust me.

Hopefully it won't be too late for your boy. Are you planning on hatching? If you don't want to send him to freezer camp, will you be able to send hatched cockerels or what will you do with them? I never hatch before 1 year old since the reproductive system is still working itself out as well as the birds are still maturing in other ways. It helps to prevent deformities. Plus if the eggs aren't their full size yet, you hatch smaller chicks end up with smaller chickens who lay smaller eggs. My cockerels' color keeps morphing and he is 9 months old right now...

But those are just my preferences. One way doesn't work for everybody. And it's been such a huge learning curve. The dynamics of my flock seem to change all the time and I have to grow and adjust as needed. It's an adventure!

But if he doesn't straighten up and act right within a reasonable amount of time (as determined by you) then I would not let him hang around, as life is too short to deal with mean roosters.

I had an aggressive barred rock roo as well and he was starting to respect me until, unfortunatly, he and the rest of my flock except one were lost to dogs that was two years ago. Maybe its the breed? We have three roosters now and one, the silver laced wyandotte is aggressive, but the other two, a birchen cochin banty and a Salmon Faverolle are very nice. I would also suggest reading through articles and posts here on BYC, thats what helped me with my BR. Good luck with him, I hope he behaves!